Part 6: Why agile is great, and where we failed

The second day of GGC has just ended and I need to ventilate regarding the biggest failure of this project. Failing to work in an agile environment.
What is great with working agile is that you during sprint reviews take a step back after adding a feature, evaluating its design and intent.
As we started working on Rune Mages this was indeed planned. However, something happened early on in the project which today can be seen in the game. Most of the […]

Part 5: Some thoughts on Color

Since Rune Mages uses Physically Based Rendering, there are some rules that must be followed for the highest visual fidelity and functionality. There are some general guidelines, such as The Comprehensive PBR Guide, that let’s you understand what values are PBR and which ones who arent. The Marmoset PBR guide is splendid as well.
So, with all these things in consideration, it is important to stay neutral in the albedo’s color. If the albedo is excessively saturated the surface will not remain […]

Part 4: Everything will be sculpted

Like I pointed out in the previous post I learned zbrush prior to this project. When starting the pre production phase I started developing the art style for Rune Mages.
One major matter I wanted to achieve was that Everything in the game will be sculpted. If Everything is sculpted then the art style is much more coherent than if only a couple of objects would be sculpted (this of course depends). As I am aiming for stylised realism I have […]

Part 3: Learn Modularity or die

My dream job at the moment, besides becoming a world famous drummer, is to become an Environment Artist at a cool game studio. Pursuing this goal I have actively studied job openings for the past 2 years. Learning about what different qualifications studios need out of their artists has become helpful for me. It has helped me pushing myself to learning more and understanding what it takes to make it in the industry. During Alumni Days 2016 I met

Part 2: Fantastic Brushes and where to find them

Brushes. You are going to need them.
I have gathered some the best free Zbrush brushes there are. if you are an artist reading this, wanting to get into digital sculpting, then you should have these.
Most important – Aj brushes and Orb’s brushes.
For fun- Michael Dunnam XMD brushes.

About the brushes
Aj brushes are amazing for stylised realism and stylised work. I use these brushes everytime I sculpt environment assets. They can be found here: Link
Then there are the Orb brushes, from legendary Michael Vicente, […]

Part 1: I’m not a character artist

I have always found people annoying as they enter the stage saying ”I am not a speaker but…”. Of course you are a speaker, you are doing it right now in front of a crowd. There is this general idea that you have to excuse yourself because in your own eyes you’ve not yet achieved a level of excellence in that particular area.
This is where I am currently at. I am working on the project ”Rune Mages” as a 3D […]

Revamping the EMP animation

Hello dear readers. As this is the last week of developing Planet Suburbia I will not spend that much time on this blog post, there is simly too much to do before the deadline.
However, this week I will showcase something really really cool, my revamped EMP animation! The EMP is a powerup the player can get hold of and when used it will wipe out all enemies attacking the player.
Let us take a look on how it first looked like!
Just […]

Protecting earth

Hello readers. I am back from the dead with yet another exciting week of game development.
This week I will talk about a rather big sprite I have been working on.
This asset is one of four shields that surrounds the planet in our game. The humans gathered as much metal as they could spare to create this outer planetary defense.
I think of the shield as an orange-peel. It protects the earth but if it gets destroyed (peeled off), the underlying fruit […]

Powerup Projectiles

Hello everyone! This week I will talk about two different assets I created for the game. I am aware I should only write about one artefact, but these assets were created basically at the same time, therefore I will talk about them both.
Here are the two assets I created:

First out is a projectile for the EMP powerup. This projectile is shot out of the main cannon and after a short travel time it explodes, creating a massive shockwave. Since the […]

Creating a multifunctional minimap

I am back once again with another week of game development! This week I would like to show you the mini-map I created for our game.
Firstly I started to concept some simple ideas and most of the concepts were taken from real world objects such as compasses, weather vanes and more. Unfortunately I have no concept images to show as they were never saved. My mistake. It also needed gameplay functionality.
 
Important things the minimap needs to do for the player […]

Creating visual effects using audio

Back from another exciting week of game development! This week I got to work on something very cool. In our game there is a special power the player can use, it is called ”Time Dilation”. It slows down time and effects enemies movement speed, to give the player a tactical advantage during gameplay.
 
The team was clear some kind of soundwave/shockwave approach was the way to go. I immediately google searched images to get some references and an idea struck me. […]

Iterating the cannon

Hi, I am Jonatan Ersarp from Group 17. I am the Lead Designer on our rendition of the project ”Planet Suburbia”.
Today I am going to blog about the avatar of the game. In our game the player takes control over a massive anti aircraft cannon, in order to defend the earth against an alien invasion. For my first concept art I took inspiration from telescopes, since the game takes place in space. The sheer size of these telescopes fascinates me […]